Review: Scooby-Doo! Moon Monster Madness

America’s favorite squad of sleuths team up once more in a new original movie, Scooby-Doo! Moon Monster Madness. Warner Bros. Home Entertainment brings you an animated feature that is sure to be loved by any age group, holds an entertaining plot, and even has a couple celebrities within the cast.

The film begins with the whole gang- Scooby-Doo, Shaggy, Fred, Velma, and Daphne- winning the last five seats in a lottery to join billionaire, Sly Baron (played by regal-voiced actor, Malcolm McDowell) aboard his brand new ship, The Sly Star One to descend into space along with a handful of other lottery winners. It’s all fun and games until a supposed alien begins to destroy parts of the ship and the crew is forced to land on Sly’s base, which is built on the dark side of the moon. The entire premise of the plot is set on Scooby-Doo and the Gang figuring out how to stop this alien… if it even is a real alien.

With surprisingly sharp wit and droll comedic timing, Moon Monster Madness is a movie that children especially would not want to miss. The great part about this film is that adults will most likely enjoy it as well. The famed movie Alien from 1979 is given a nod several times within the story. For example, the suspicious AI robot that the audience isn’t too sure they can trust, is mimicked in one character, and the design of the alien that chases the crew is very similar to that of Ridley Scott’s. This gives the film a certain je ne se quoi that provokes older audience members to get interested in the plot. In addition to this, more mature viewers may appreciate that Matthew Lillard, the same actor who played Shaggy in the live-action take on the Scooby-Doo franchise, plays the voice of Shaggy.

Another quality that one may notice is the character designs have not been changed. Unlike many other rebooted animated characters that have been around for years, Scooby-Doo and the Gang remain unmodified. This aspect successfully preserves the nostalgia Scooby-Doo movies bring to the table as well as the timeless charisma each protagonist possesses.

Scooby-Doo! Moon Monster Madness is a piece of work that might quite possibly be underrated due to its going straight to DVD, however I am here to tell you all that this animated film should not be overlooked. It’s fun, silly, well acted, well written, and decently animated. If you have children, definitely scoop a copy of this up- and if you love Scooby-Doo, do the same thing.